The technology described herein relates to the design of semiconductor circuits, and more particularly, relates to a simulation system for estimating a self-heating characteristic of a circuit.
In general, a schematic circuit is designed by a schematic tool to design a semiconductor integrated circuit. The schematic circuit denotes elements included in the semiconductor integrated circuit and a connection relationship among the elements. Next, the elements of the schematic circuit are designed with patterns of material layers, such as a conductive layer, a semiconductor layer, and an insulation layer. Then, a semiconductor integrated circuit with a needed function is designed through iterative deposition and patterning of the material layers, based on the layout that is created, such that patterns are disposed vertically and horizontally.
After the schematic circuit of the semiconductor integrated circuit is created by the schematic tool, an operation of the semiconductor integrated circuit is tested by simulating a netlist, provided by the schematic tool, by use of a simulation device. The schematic circuit is revised when the simulation result is not acceptable.
Self-heating of circuits is an issue in designing a circuit for a mobile device. The self-heating influences device performance and reliability. For this reason, a design analysis environment needs to be constructed to optimize a circuit design considering the self-heating characteristic. It is possible to use a dedicated simulator for heat analysis of a designed circuit. However, the heat analysis of the schematic circuit at an early design phase is not practical in terms of time and cost.
Thus, an analysis environment is urgent which allows a circuit designer to optimize a circuit by use of a heat analysis result.